In this next installment of “Back to Basics”, I’m going to share how crazy easy it is to make applesauce for your family.

Before I found “Natural” applesauce for my family, I tended to avoid buying applesauce because of the added sugars. Mott’s and White House both now make “natural” applesauce that comes in nice containers for lunchboxes. I feel a little better about it.

Nonetheless, I came into a huge bag of red delicious apples when some of us spouses were setting up Christmas stockings for Dave’s squadron’s Christmas party. I had this bowl with a pile of apples throughout the holidays, and only Timmy was eating them. The rest of us hate red delicious apples, other types taste so much better.

That being said, I couldn’t stand to see all those apples go to waste: so I tossed them (after cleaning them) in a pot and brought them to a boil. The picture above has about 15 small apples in it, each apple cut in half.  You don’t even have to bother peeling or coring them. We’ll take care of that later.

Let the apples gently boil for about 30-45 minutes. All that matter is that they’re soft all the way through. But don’t boil them for too long, they’ll get too watery.

Drain the apples in a colander:

Then you need to break out your Foley Food Mill.

“My what????”

Your Foley Food Mill! The one you ran out and bought after reading my post about homemade blueberry syrup last July.

“Ummmm…..”

Fine….after reading this post you will want one for sure, so let me drop an easy link down so you can buy it as soon as you see how simple homemade applesauce is:

Okay, where were we?  Ah yes, let’s pile a few of the apple halves in the food mill and give her a whirl. By not peeling or coring the apples, I think you have more pulp available to process through the food mill.